Quake-rattled Singati rises from the rubble but landslide fear still haunts

SINGATI/DOLAKHA, Dec 4: Outsiders visiting Singati Bazaar these days will doubt if this small market was really badly rattled by the 2015 devastating earthquake. Except landslide debris just above the settlement, anyone visiting the place for the first time will find no marks of the devastation that affected one-third of the country.

Quake victims in Singati have already built multi-story concrete buildings while many quake victims in other parts of the country are still struggling to rebuild their quake-damaged houses.

Though there is no sign of the 2015 quake in Singati, the place faces the risk of landslides. Also, the risk of water-induced disasters from the roaring Tamakoshi and Singatikhola haunts locals round the clock. The settlement is situated few meters away from the landslide. “I can't sleep in the night when the image of the landslide comes to my mind,” said Hari Bahadur Shrestha, “It's not a habitable place but we have no other option to living here.”

Eighty-three years old Shrestha is currently living at his married daughter's house after his house in Bulung was destroyed in the earthquake.

Of the 12 people killed in Singati, 10 were buried under the same landslide in the aftershock. This tiny market was the epicenter of the aftershock on May 12, 2015 that killed the most people after April 25's devastating earthquake. None of the houses were standing there after the earthquake.

But most houses destroyed in the quake are already constructed. The fear of landslide and flood, however, has not decreased among Singati locals.